Holman Hunt on Ford Madox Brown's mistreatment by the art establishment and later years

[This passage from Pre-Raphaelitism and the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood takes the form of a single paragraph, which I have divided, adding subtitles. George P. Landow.]

Brown rebukes the Members of the R.A.

A
banquet was given to art and literature by the Lord
Mayor at the Mansion House; Millais, representing Sir
F. Leighton, was seated at the high table next to the host, and Madox Brown was exactly on the opposite side
of the table, facing Millais and a bevy of other Academicians.
There were many vacant places between him
and me, and I asked him to come and take the chair next
to me, explaining that he would meet friends whose
conversation would interest him. "Thank you," he
said, "I would rather sit here." I left him alone, severely
frowning at his diplomaed brothers of the brush, where he
remained all the evening, silent. A mutual friend told me
that Brown had said he wished particularly to draw the
attention of the Academicians to the fact, that although he
was not a member of the Academy, he had been conspicuously
honoured by the civic authorities with a central
place at the high table. It is possible that many of the
Academicians went home without benefiting by the reproof
that dear old "Bruno" felt to be so necessary for them.
[II, 382-83]

The sadness of Brown's last years

He had now lived beyond the full term of threescore years
and ten, and his days had become sad. His only son
Oliver, a youth of great promise both as painter and writer,
had died, and this bitterness was followed soon after by
the death of his wife. While still struggling manfully
with ever-continuing money difficulties, he could not
repress complaint to a friend at his evil fortune. His
health was fast failing, and he was seven hundred pounds
in debt, which was indeed a disgrace to his country. The
profession of an artist is an expensive one; a writer
needs but his pens, ink and paper with a little space to
write in, but an artist must have large rooms with
many appliances, as necessary to him as scaffolding to
a builder in his operations. He must have money at all
stages of figure subjects to pay models and to buy
materials; during the probationary period of his career
he may bear many discomforts with patience, but when
he has the full responsibilities of life; he must have the
opportunity of repose away from sight of his work, that
he may not miss refreshment of mind and body. Brown
had always been most studious, industrious, and frugal,
and had produced many noble works of which the country
must eventually be proud; yet here he was in his last years
suffering in mind as though he had been a profitless ne'er-do-well.

His friends raise money to pay his debts

A few of his friends met together and agreed to
raise a subscription to purchase some of his works without
his knowledge, and the contributions had accumulated
although without public appeal to a sum handsomely
covering his liabilities. Unfortunately, just as all was
prepared for approaching him, a newspaper stated the fact
in its gossip column, which Brown saw. He was inflamed
to great anger, and went off to Frederick Shields, who
was acting as secretary to the fund, and expressed his
indignation at the insult that had been done him; he
denounced it as an attempt to impose charity upon him
and left the house in hot temper. Shields discreetly
kept silence and trusted to time to appease the artist's
ruffled feelings. Within a week Brown communicated to
him that he was sorry for his outbreak of displeasure,
that he now recognised all had been done in thoughtful
kindness, and hoped his friends would not think him
so ungrateful as he allowed himself to appear at first.[II, 384-85]

Christ washing the
Disciples hung in the National Gallery

The possessor of the picture of "Christ washing the
Disciples' Feet," who had offered it at Christie's a few
months before, and had bought it in at £80, consented to
take for it a portion of the sum in hand, and the Council
of the National Gallery expressed themselves pleased to
receive this tardily appreciated and yet truly noble picture.
Since it has been hung in the Gallery the work has ever
grown in reputation. The painter's strength was now
fast failing, he took up his daily work each morning, but
increasing weakness interrupted his application, and on
the 6th of October 1893 he breathed his last. I attended
his funeral at Finchley Cemetery, and left feeling
profoundly how his death would be to me a never-ending
loss.
[II, 385]